7 ms·

Lots of companies are cutting ties with China, Apple is obligated to do so. But the more companies cutting ties with China, make it easier for both China and US

by chrgy 3y ago

Lots of companies are cutting ties with China, Apple is obligated to do so. But the more companies cutting ties with China, make it easier for both China and US to have Military conflict on Taiwan. Replicating TSMC is in the making by intel but It will take Years, and would have been nice if APPLE, AMD and Nvidia would Start a Fab Together in the US as a part of the Chips ACT.

Workaccount2 3y ago
I listened to an interview with the former CEO (and now chairman) of Microchip the other day. Microchip actually turned down money beyond $150MM from the chips act because it had too many strings attached to make building a fab with it worthwhile.
- bsder 3y ago
  We call them Microcheap for a reason ... And it's kind of stupid because Microchip is still having 52+ week delivery issues. ST has gained three customers that I know of becuase of this.
  - himinlomax 3y ago
    If ST gains customer because of their better lead times ... that means Microchip must really, really sucks. Fun fact: ST management panicked at the start of the pandemic, started immediately downsizing, afaik they still haven't been able to catch up to demand.
    - m-ee 3y ago
      We use both at my job, sustaining products with microchip and pre production with ST, it’s about even for terrible lead times. At least with ST I don’t have terrible debug hardware on top of my terrible lead times. I don’t know why anyone would use microchip for a new product, maybe bought in to the Atmel ARM chips already?
local_crmdgeon 3y ago
you have cause and effect backwards here. https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/decoupling-is-just-going-to-happen https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/decoupling-is-just-going-to-ha...
WhyNotHugo 3y ago
As a third party, it's kinda sad that the US is so invested in going to war and seeking even more conflict. All this energy could be invested in cooperating and building together. Instead, it's being wasted in preparing for yet another pointless armed conflict. It's not like we don't have enough problems already.
- DontchaKnowit 3y ago
  I mean you can stick your fingers into all your various sensory orifices and ignore the growing turmoil between Taiwan and China all you want, but the reality is that there is nothing the US can or will do that will prevent China from doing what they please with regards to Taiwan.
  - KptMarchewa 3y ago
    One word: carriers.
  - another2another 3y ago
    If that was the case China would already have done it (like they happily gobbled up Hong Kong), but they haven't. What stayed their hand?
    - DontchaKnowit 3y ago
      China has legal right to hong kong, not to taiwan. Completely different situation.
  - WhyNotHugo 3y ago
    I'm aware of the politics of China (I have acquaintances in both mainland and Taiwan). But a foreign country having internal issues isn't an excuse for the US to suddenly decide it's a good time to invade it (or to threaten to invade it and destroy its factories).
    - DontchaKnowit 3y ago
pphysch 3y ago
> Lots of companies are cutting ties with China Do you have anything to back this up, preferably not cherry-picking pandemic data? Last I checked Apple had 90% of their manufacturing done in China and lost an Indian supplier this week. Bing apparently just became the #1 search engine in China among desktop users (whatever that means). China just came out of nowhere as the #1 car exporter. The idea that the world will isolate China on behalf of Washington is a unipolar pipe dream.
- threeseed 3y ago
  > The idea that the world will isolate China on behalf of Washington Countries are doing it because of economic coercion. China has banned Australian products from import (in violation of WTO rules) because of its position on Taiwan, Quad, Chinese foreign investment etc. Similarly for Sweden. Which is one reason why EU has not been keen on a comprehensive FTA with China.
  - pphysch 3y ago
    It's a stretch to call it "coercion" when it is directly in response to offenses committed against China [1] and primarily driven by Washington. Framing every negative action as coercion, regardless of causality, drains that word of meaning. The bottom line is China wants to do business, but Washington wants China to be contained. [1] - https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/12/1/australia-china-tensions-explained-in-500-words https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/12/1/australia-china-...
    - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
      > China wants to do business, but Washington wants China to be contained China expelling diplomats and cutting economic ties because an Australian college student said something mean or Baltic nation didn't agree with the party line on Taiwan is not wanting to do business.
      - pphysch 3y ago
manv1 3y ago
The whole point of bringing countries like China into the world economic system is to make sure that they realize that aggressive action is counterproductive and they refrain from doing so. Unfortunately that hasn't really worked with China, which is why the world is starting to decouple from China; the CPP still prioritizes its institutional needs over "The People", which is ironic since they're supposed to be working for "The People." That's probably why the CPP is scared of the people and tries to control them.
- thrashh 3y ago
  The world is really decoupling with China because it is so unpredictable. Xi made himself forever leader only 10 years ago and it's been a unpredictable rollercoaster of policy since then. Stability is the foundation of every working relationship. Everyone wants to latch onto you when you are stable. You can even work with an adversary as long as they are stable. China had it for a while before Xi. Most countries have yet to achieve long-term stability. Stability is super difficult to achieve.
  - zorrotorro 3y ago
    The world is decoupling from China because US sees China as a main global challenger and has asked / forced the hand of everybody else to decouple. China is actually quite predictable and with a stable (forever) leader it's even more predictable. US poking China creates instability.
    - thrashh 3y ago
      Authoritative leaders inherently cannot be predictable because one person has a lot of power and can easily make sweeping changes. Even though any organization led by a large committee is absolutely terrible at making long-term, coherent decisions, it also means that everything moves at a snail's place and any outsider can react faster than the committee can, and decisions also never stray too far from a certain point because there are too many cooks in the kitchen. America in a nutshell. Plus the forever leader thing only happened ~10 years ago. That's too recent. I would only ever call a country politically stable if it hasn't changed in like 100 years. The US, for better and worse, politically has barely changed in 250 years. Sucks for Americans (but not entirely) but great for the world. When Xi declared himself forever leader, that basically reset the clock back to 0 years. Plus once Xi goes out of power, that basically resets the clock again because new leader, new policy. At the end of the day, when you have a lot of something you want to keep safe (like your business), you want to put it with the person whose situation hasn't changed in the longest time. You don't even care necessarily whether that person is good. You just want that stability.
xwowsersx 3y ago
Why is Apple obligated to do so?
- smoldesu 3y ago
  Presumably because they care so much about privacy being a human right, and every day This Page[0] exists it breaks their heart. Breaking ties with China would be a great way to start getting tough on autocratic privacy overreach. [0] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351
  - xwowsersx 3y ago
    Oh ok, that I understand completely. I see why there are compelling reasons for them to do so, but I didn't understand the language of "obligated" to do so. That made it sound like there's some formal obligation, legal or otherwise.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> the more companies cutting ties with China, make it easier for both China and US to have Military conflict on Taiwan The coefficient of trade and belligerence is about 0.2, i.e. "a doubling of trade on average leads to a 20% diminution of belligerence" [1]. And trade with China continues to grow [2]. I wouldn't read the semiconductor re-shoring as materially changing the odds of a war per se. [1] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Solomon-Polachek/publication/258144983_Conflict_and_Trade/links/55a5266608ae81aec9133d52/Conflict-and-Trade.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Solomon-Polachek/public... [2] https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html
ksec 3y ago
>Lots of companies are cutting ties with China, Apple is obligated to do so. Not only is Apple not obligated to do so, they literally double down their investment as recently as 2021. In 2022 their total Chinese Suppliers were still rising. And that is excluding some suppliers slotted into other countries via different HQ strategy. To see how many people believe Apple is doing the right thing just shows another master piece of Apple's PR.

by chrgy 3y ago

Workaccount2 3y ago

I listened to an interview with the former CEO (and now chairman) of Microchip the other day. Microchip actually turned down money beyond $150MM from the chips act because it had too many strings attached to make building a fab with it worthwhile.

bsder 3y ago
We call them Microcheap for a reason ... And it's kind of stupid because Microchip is still having 52+ week delivery issues. ST has gained three customers that I know of becuase of this.
- himinlomax 3y ago
  If ST gains customer because of their better lead times ... that means Microchip must really, really sucks. Fun fact: ST management panicked at the start of the pandemic, started immediately downsizing, afaik they still haven't been able to catch up to demand.
  - m-ee 3y ago
    We use both at my job, sustaining products with microchip and pre production with ST, it’s about even for terrible lead times. At least with ST I don’t have terrible debug hardware on top of my terrible lead times. I don’t know why anyone would use microchip for a new product, maybe bought in to the Atmel ARM chips already?

local_crmdgeon 3y ago

you have cause and effect backwards here. https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/decoupling-is-just-going-to-happen https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/decoupling-is-just-going-to-ha...

WhyNotHugo 3y ago

As a third party, it's kinda sad that the US is so invested in going to war and seeking even more conflict. All this energy could be invested in cooperating and building together. Instead, it's being wasted in preparing for yet another pointless armed conflict. It's not like we don't have enough problems already.

DontchaKnowit 3y ago
I mean you can stick your fingers into all your various sensory orifices and ignore the growing turmoil between Taiwan and China all you want, but the reality is that there is nothing the US can or will do that will prevent China from doing what they please with regards to Taiwan.
- KptMarchewa 3y ago
  One word: carriers.
- another2another 3y ago
  If that was the case China would already have done it (like they happily gobbled up Hong Kong), but they haven't. What stayed their hand?
  - DontchaKnowit 3y ago
    China has legal right to hong kong, not to taiwan. Completely different situation.
- WhyNotHugo 3y ago
  I'm aware of the politics of China (I have acquaintances in both mainland and Taiwan). But a foreign country having internal issues isn't an excuse for the US to suddenly decide it's a good time to invade it (or to threaten to invade it and destroy its factories).
  - DontchaKnowit 3y ago

pphysch 3y ago

> Lots of companies are cutting ties with China Do you have anything to back this up, preferably not cherry-picking pandemic data? Last I checked Apple had 90% of their manufacturing done in China and lost an Indian supplier this week. Bing apparently just became the #1 search engine in China among desktop users (whatever that means). China just came out of nowhere as the #1 car exporter. The idea that the world will isolate China on behalf of Washington is a unipolar pipe dream.

threeseed 3y ago
> The idea that the world will isolate China on behalf of Washington Countries are doing it because of economic coercion. China has banned Australian products from import (in violation of WTO rules) because of its position on Taiwan, Quad, Chinese foreign investment etc. Similarly for Sweden. Which is one reason why EU has not been keen on a comprehensive FTA with China.
- pphysch 3y ago
  It's a stretch to call it "coercion" when it is directly in response to offenses committed against China [1] and primarily driven by Washington. Framing every negative action as coercion, regardless of causality, drains that word of meaning. The bottom line is China wants to do business, but Washington wants China to be contained. [1] - https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/12/1/australia-china-tensions-explained-in-500-words https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/12/1/australia-china-...
  - JumpCrisscross 3y ago
    > China wants to do business, but Washington wants China to be contained China expelling diplomats and cutting economic ties because an Australian college student said something mean or Baltic nation didn't agree with the party line on Taiwan is not wanting to do business.
    - pphysch 3y ago

manv1 3y ago

The whole point of bringing countries like China into the world economic system is to make sure that they realize that aggressive action is counterproductive and they refrain from doing so. Unfortunately that hasn't really worked with China, which is why the world is starting to decouple from China; the CPP still prioritizes its institutional needs over "The People", which is ironic since they're supposed to be working for "The People." That's probably why the CPP is scared of the people and tries to control them.

thrashh 3y ago
The world is really decoupling with China because it is so unpredictable. Xi made himself forever leader only 10 years ago and it's been a unpredictable rollercoaster of policy since then. Stability is the foundation of every working relationship. Everyone wants to latch onto you when you are stable. You can even work with an adversary as long as they are stable. China had it for a while before Xi. Most countries have yet to achieve long-term stability. Stability is super difficult to achieve.
- zorrotorro 3y ago
  The world is decoupling from China because US sees China as a main global challenger and has asked / forced the hand of everybody else to decouple. China is actually quite predictable and with a stable (forever) leader it's even more predictable. US poking China creates instability.
  - thrashh 3y ago
    Authoritative leaders inherently cannot be predictable because one person has a lot of power and can easily make sweeping changes. Even though any organization led by a large committee is absolutely terrible at making long-term, coherent decisions, it also means that everything moves at a snail's place and any outsider can react faster than the committee can, and decisions also never stray too far from a certain point because there are too many cooks in the kitchen. America in a nutshell. Plus the forever leader thing only happened ~10 years ago. That's too recent. I would only ever call a country politically stable if it hasn't changed in like 100 years. The US, for better and worse, politically has barely changed in 250 years. Sucks for Americans (but not entirely) but great for the world. When Xi declared himself forever leader, that basically reset the clock back to 0 years. Plus once Xi goes out of power, that basically resets the clock again because new leader, new policy. At the end of the day, when you have a lot of something you want to keep safe (like your business), you want to put it with the person whose situation hasn't changed in the longest time. You don't even care necessarily whether that person is good. You just want that stability.

xwowsersx 3y ago

Why is Apple obligated to do so?

smoldesu 3y ago
Presumably because they care so much about privacy being a human right, and every day This Page[0] exists it breaks their heart. Breaking ties with China would be a great way to start getting tough on autocratic privacy overreach. [0] https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351 https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208351
- xwowsersx 3y ago
  Oh ok, that I understand completely. I see why there are compelling reasons for them to do so, but I didn't understand the language of "obligated" to do so. That made it sound like there's some formal obligation, legal or otherwise.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

> the more companies cutting ties with China, make it easier for both China and US to have Military conflict on Taiwan The coefficient of trade and belligerence is about 0.2, i.e. "a doubling of trade on average leads to a 20% diminution of belligerence" [1]. And trade with China continues to grow [2]. I wouldn't read the semiconductor re-shoring as materially changing the odds of a war per se. [1] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Solomon-Polachek/publication/258144983_Conflict_and_Trade/links/55a5266608ae81aec9133d52/Conflict-and-Trade.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Solomon-Polachek/public... [2] https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5700.html

ksec 3y ago

>Lots of companies are cutting ties with China, Apple is obligated to do so. Not only is Apple not obligated to do so, they literally double down their investment as recently as 2021. In 2022 their total Chinese Suppliers were still rising. And that is excluding some suppliers slotted into other countries via different HQ strategy. To see how many people believe Apple is doing the right thing just shows another master piece of Apple's PR.